The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision Blog confirmed late today that Spider-Man 4, a movie that had recently hit the brakes due to creative differences primarily over what villain the movie should use, has been outright canceled.

Columbia, Sony, and Marvel Studios will instead reboot the Spider-Man movie franchise, launching a new series of films with Peter Parker in high school, more similar to the take on the character seen in Marvel Comics' Ultimate Comics Spider-Man. With the relaunch, director Sam Raimi and stars Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst, who had been involved with the first three big screen successes, all part ways with the franchise.

Raimi presented far from sour grapes, instead wishing Marvel luck saying, "the studio and Marvel have a unique opportunity to take the franchise in a new direction, and I know they will do a terrific job."

Sony's press release:

Culver City, CA (January 11, 2010) -- Peter Parker is going back to high school when the next Spider-Man hits theaters in the summer of 2012. Columbia Pictures and Marvel Studios announced today they are moving forward with a film based on a script by James Vanderbilt that focuses on a teenager grappling with both contemporary human problems and amazing super-human crises.

The new chapter in the Spider-Man franchise produced by Columbia, Marvel Studios and Avi Arad and Laura Ziskin, will have a new cast and filmmaking team. Spider-Man 4 was to have been released in 2011, but had not yet gone into production.

I'm very happy that Spider Man 4 got canned. It's best that the studio doesn't force Raimi to do another villain he doesn't want to. Look at what he did with the symbiote.

Hopefully they'll cast someone who is actually pretty for MJ. It would be cool if Cameron could come back on board. If he could direct and use his screenplay then that would be swell. Wishful thinking but now I'm feeling more optimistic about the series.

My only small gripe is that the series is getting a reboot. It feels too soon to reboot it already. I didn't read Ultimate Spider Man. How is the Ultimate Spider Man take different from say Web of Spider Man or Peter Parker The Spectacular Spider Man?

CheMateo wrote: I didn't read Ultimate Spider Man. How is the Ultimate Spider Man take different from say Web of Spider Man or Peter Parker The Spectacular Spider Man?

It's actually very good. It maintains a lot of what is great about Spider-Man while infusing some modern ideas and technologies into the mix (instead of being a freelance photographer, Petey works as the webmaster of the Bugle's web site). A lot of it has to do, though, with the great writing done by Brian Michael Bendis.

Thanks for the answer. But what worries me about this reboot are the rumored short listed candidates, like Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner. Hopefully it is all a load of rubbish. It is nice to hear the directors that are be considered. James Cameron, Wes Anderson, David Fincher, and Marc Webb.

CheMateo wrote: I didn't read Ultimate Spider Man. How is the Ultimate Spider Man take different from say Web of Spider Man or Peter Parker The Spectacular Spider Man?

It's actually very good. It maintains a lot of what is great about Spider-Man while infusing some modern ideas and technologies into the mix (instead of being a freelance photographer, Petey works as the webmaster of the Bugle's web site). A lot of it has to do, though, with the great writing done by Brian Michael Bendis.

yeah I totally prefer the Ultimate Spider-man over the current Spider-man comics at this point, mostly because Ultimate Spider-man didn't have his marriage get retconned out of existence by making a deal with the deal to save his aunt

El Asian wrote:yeah I totally prefer the Ultimate Spider-man over the current Spider-man comics at this point, mostly because Ultimate Spider-man didn't have his marriage get retconned out of existence by making a deal with the deal to save his aunt

Yeah, THAT was the one I was the most miffed about with the whole One More Day/Brand New Day stuff. Prior to Joe Q being promoted to editor-in-chief, the folks at Marvel went as far as to attempt to kill off MJ in a fool-hardy effort to have Petey "not tied down." It was ridicules and completely unappreciative. Then they prolong setting them back together after Joe Q took the reigns and when they got together JMS cemented it HARD of how valuable the marriage is. One thing I will say about how Joe Q is handling all of the recent stuff, though, is that at least the goal is to set them back together (I hear by the end of the year) as he's a fan of the marriage and has stated that the MC2 timeline is the ideal progression as far as the Spider-Man mythos goes.

Well a new name that is making the rumored list is Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I would actually be cool with Gordon-Levitt. He is the best of the rumored names I've heard so far. I haven't seen all of his post-3rd Rock work but I do think he was very good in Brick and The Lookout.